mmmmmbeeer

It’s mental. He’s pressing with RISP and, to make matters worse with RISP, he’s clearly being coached to approach every AB with a “be the aggressor” attitude. The good news? He seems very coachable, and kinda proved to be in AZ last season. The bad news? He’s light on instinct and clearly needs to start being coached on situational approaches. TBF, he did have a few singles/doubles for RBI the last week or so, so perhaps these convos have already started.

Not familiar enough with all the targets and contract situations, but I think we’ll see a very “eating loot” kinda deadline. Carlson could be trade bait, but I don’t think Getz is quite there yet. Throw some dollars at the roster and see how it shakes out. It’s too early to be putting serious chips in, imo. I believe Getz is in the same state of mind.

So clutch. A confident Hicks has the ability to completely change the future of this team. The ability to shorten a game to 7 innings is YUGE.

That was a very, very important win for the belief this team has in themselves. Winnin’ ugly.

Infield in is Will realizing he took hitters out of the game

Radio feed saying that came from the bench.

Unreal. Is Will catching?

Either he’s an every day player or he’s not. Either he’s a part of this young core or he’s not. It was the wrong decision.

I still can’t believe he sat Sammy.

I think a lot of the criticisms around Will are reactionary. That? That was just plain mismanaged.

You cannot pull Sam from the game there. Wtf

Hell yes

Get through this series and next then start competing again. We’ve been facing some really solid pitching and offenses.

DJ said BMont had a mistake to hit and popped it up. Growing pains.

And swinging first pitch with men on. He’s gotta be about 75% swinging on first pitch with RISP. Got a guy on the ropes after a walk and hit batsman, and this idiot is first pitch hunting.

He just gets up there and hacks away. With RISP he’s first-pitch hacking damn near every time. He looks like a very immature hitter with his approach. That average is slowly walking down toward .200 and his OPS working its way down to sub-.750. Might be time for him to pretend he’s not here to swing out of his shoes every AB.

I think not getting the AS break is hitting them both a bit. Day off at home will do them some good. The most encouraging thing about the recent play in the road is you can still see them lose focus a bit from time to time, but they’re snapping back quickly. Flying, hotels, shitty visitor clubhouses, not sleeping in your own bed….road trips are mentally draining. Losing focus on the road is inevitable for any team in any sport…it’s getting into the habit of refocusing that shows maturity.

That’s what Len suggested when Taylor entered the game.

Struck out the side throwing 5 balls to 3 hitters.

I don’t hate slowly bringing him along to become an 8th inning guy. Keep him hungry and fighting for something.

Taylor, Huddy, Newcy?

Only 83 pitches. Leave him in after control issues? I pull him. Duran with a hit and Cauley with the dong earlier.

DJ and Len were saying he's intentionally lowering his velocity to improve his control. He doesn't have the extension necessary to make a 94mph heater feel like 97-98.....a 94mph heater isn't difficult to hit. Not to mention, the velocity difference between his fb and offspeed become less, leading to far less swing and miss. If he can't K batters, he's not going to be successful in MLB. He needs to work on his control when throwing as hard as he's capable of throwing in a starting role.

Should’ve gotten into a rundown to see if the run could score, but don’t mind bailing out Chase there. Chase, Sammy, Mune, Vargas is a great way to run the 9th if we need to score.

Almost like players play better on winning teams or when there’s something to play for.